Excerpt from Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Diary Account

About the time that I reentered the Bruce family, an event occurred of disastrous
import to the colored people. The slave Hamlin, the first fugitive slave that came under the new law, was given up by the
bloodhounds of the north to the bloodhounds of the south. It was the beginning of a reign of terror to the colored population.
The great city rushed on in its whirl of excitement, taking no note of the "short and simple annals of the poor." But while
fashionables were listening to the thrilling voice of Jenny Lind in Metropolitan Hall, the thrilling voices of poor hunted
colored people went up, in an agony of supplication, to the Lord, from Zion's church. Many families, who had lived in the
city for twenty years, fled from it now. Many a poor washerwoman, who, by hard labor, had made herself a comfortable home,
was obliged to sacrifice her furniture, bid a hurried farewell to friends, and seek her fortune among strangers in Canada.
Many a wife discovered a secret she had never known before -- that her husband was a fugitive, and must leave her to insure
his own safety. Worse still, many a husband discovered that his wife had fled from slavery years ago, and as "the child follows
the condition of its mother," the children of his love were liable to be seized and carried into slavery. Every where, in
those humble homes, there was consternation and anguish. But what cared the legislators of the "dominant race" for the blood
they were crushing out of trampled hearts?

Jacobs, Harriet A. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Boston, 1861.

Recommended Reading:
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, by Harriet Jacobs. Description: "Slavery is terrible for men, but it is far
more terrible for women," Harriet Jacobs wrote in 1861. At that time she was an escaped slave living in the north, but the
Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 meant that she could not longer consider being in the northern states a guarantee of freedom or
safety. Her book is an eloquent recital of the suffering that is slavery. Families broken apart; promises of freedom made
but never kept; whippings, beatings, and burnings; masters selling their own children - all are recounted with precise detail
and a blazing indignation. Continued below…

Harriet Jacobs' master started
pursuing her when she was fifteen; in disgust she continually refused and avoided him. Her first attempt at revenge and escape
failed: she became the lover of a local unmarried white man and had several children, but even then her master refused to
sell her. Finally, in desperation, she ran away and hid in an uninsulated garret, three feet high at its tallest point with
almost no air or light. She stayed there for seven years, enduring cold, heat, and a crippling lack of movement, always hoping
to catch a glimpse of her children through a crack in the walls as they walked by on the road below her. At last she had a
chance to escape to the North. Her story is a remarkable testimony to her strength and courage, and an unrelenting attack
upon the institution of slavery.

Recommended Reading:
African Voices of the Atlantic Slave Trade:
Beyond the Silence and the Shame. Description: The story of the Atlantic slave trade has largely
been filtered through the records of white Europeans, but in this watershed book, Anne C. Bailey focuses on memories of the
trade from the African perspective. African chiefs and other elders in an area of southeastern Ghana once famously called "the Old Slave Coast" share stories that reveal that Africans were both traders and victims of
the trade. Though Africans were not equal partners with Europeans, their involvement had devastating consequences on their
history and sense of identity. Continued below…

Like trauma victims, many African societies experience a fragmented view of their past
that partially explains the silence and shame around the slave trade. Capturing astonishing oral histories that were handed
down through generations of storytellers, Bailey breaks this deafening silence and explores the delicate nature of historical
memory in this rare, unprecedented book.

Recommended Reading: Uncle Tom's Cabin (Wordsworth Classics), by Harriet Beecher Stowe (Author). Description:
Edited and with an Introduction and Notes by Dr Keith Carabine, University of Kent at Canterbury. Uncle Tom's
Cabin is the most popular, influential and controversial book written by an American. Stowe's rich, panoramic novel passionately
dramatizes why the whole of America is
implicated in and responsible for the sin of slavery, and resoundingly concludes that only 'repentance, justice and mercy'
will prevent the onset of 'the wrath of Almighty God!'.

Recommended Reading: The Underground Railroad: Authentic Narratives and First-Hand Accounts. Description: A "conductor" based in Philadelphia,
Still (1821–1902) helped guide fugitive slaves to safety in the years before the Civil War. He also created this unforgettable
history, a collection of carefully preserved letters, newspaper articles, and firsthand accounts about refugees' hardships,
narrow escapes, and deadly struggles. Over 50 illustrations. "Highly recommended."

Recommended Viewing: Slavery and the Making of America (240 minutes),
Starring: Morgan Freeman; Director: William R. Grant. Description: Acclaimed actor Morgan Freeman narrates this compelling documentary, which features a score by Michael Whalen.
Underscoring how slavery impacted the growth of this country's Southern and Northern states; the series examines issues still
relevant today. The variety of cultures from which the slaves originated provided the budding states with a multitude of skills
that had a dramatic effect on the diverse communities. From joining the British in the Revolutionary War, to fleeing to Canada, to joining rebel communities in the U.S.
the slaves sought freedom in many ways, ultimately having a far-reaching effect on the new hemisphere they were forced to
inhabit. AWARDED 5 STARS by americancivilwarhistory.org

Recommended Reading: Lincoln
and Douglas: The Debates that Defined America
(Simon & Schuster) (February 5, 2008) (Hardcover). Description: In 1858, Abraham Lincoln was known as a successful Illinois
lawyer who had achieved some prominence in state politics as a leader in the new Republican Party. Two years later, he was
elected president and was on his way to becoming the greatest chief executive in American history. What carried this one-term
congressman from obscurity to fame was the campaign he mounted for the United States Senate against the country's most formidable
politician, Stephen A. Douglas, in the summer and fall of 1858. Lincoln challenged Douglas
directly in one of his greatest speeches -- "A house divided against itself cannot stand" -- and confronted Douglas on the
questions of slavery and the inviolability of the Union in seven fierce debates. As this
brilliant narrative by the prize-winning Lincoln scholar Allen Guelzo dramatizes, Lincoln would emerge a predominant national figure, the leader of his
party, the man who would bear the burden of the national confrontation. Continued below...

Of course,
the great issue between Lincoln and Douglas was slavery. Douglas was the champion of "popular sovereignty," of letting states and territories decide
for themselves whether to legalize slavery. Lincoln drew a
moral line, arguing that slavery was a violation both of natural law and of the principles expressed in the Declaration of
Independence. No majority could ever make slavery right, he argued. Lincoln lost that Senate
race to Douglas, though he came close to toppling the "Little Giant," whom almost everyone
thought was unbeatable. Guelzo's Lincoln and Douglas brings alive their debates and this whole year of campaigns and underscores
their centrality in the greatest conflict in American history. The encounters between Lincoln and Douglas engage a key question
in American political life: What is democracy's purpose? Is it to satisfy the desires of the majority? Or is it to achieve
a just and moral public order? These were the real questions in 1858 that led to the Civil War. They remain questions for
Americans today.

Recommended Viewing:Roots (Four-Disc 30th Anniversary Edition) (DVD) (573 minutes). Description:
Based on Alex Haley's best-selling novel about his African ancestors, Roots followed several generations in the lives of a
slave family. The saga began with Kunta Kinte (LeVar Burton), a West African youth captured by slave raiders and shipped to
America in the 1700s. The family's saga is depicted up until the Civil War where
Kunte Kinte's grandson gained emancipation. Roots made its greatest impression on the ratings and widespread popularity it
garnered. On average, 130 million - almost half the country at the time - saw all or part of the series. Interesting fact:
Alex Haley was also the founding father of the U.S. Coast Guard’s Public Affairs Office.